The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir
Sarah Davachi
The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir
Boomkat Product Review:
Sarah Davachi surpasses herself on this one, following the brilliant 'Antiphonals' and 'Two Sisters' with a decisive suite of mind-bending psychoacoustic chamber-prog dilations that effortlessly reconcile her last decade of relentless R&D. There's plenty of organ music around at the minute, but 'The Head...' undoubtedly sets a new high: sonorous, cryptic, endlessly inquisitive music that pulses with mystery and supernatural awe.
Like every instrument with a romanticised cultural chronology, the organ as an instrument should be more than just a simple texture to tack on for aesthetic gravitas. Davachi understands this implicitly, and breaks the fourth wall on 'The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir', challenging perceptions while acknowledging the instrument's contemporary ubiquity and historical symbolism. It's deviously clever stuff that concludes a loose trilogy with a swagger that never overwhelms its formal rigor - only bolsters it. Like its predecessors, the album further refines Davachi's idiosyncratic minimalism, but this time the Los Angeles-based composer grinds her skills until they're obsidian sharp, cutting her litany of influences into a lysergic compound that hums with arcane power.
We'd never be so bold to say it's tongue-in-cheek exactly, but Davachi's limberness here allows her to mess with the formula and compose hypnotic stretches that operate on multiple levels simultaneously. At times, the album pays its respect to the distant past, harnessing the spine-chilling roundness of the organ and its sacred resonances - but Davachi is just as passionate about classic '70s prog rock, psych and kosmische music, and if you listen close enough you can make out blurred traces of the genres' lofty conceptual bombast and druggy fractalism hanging in the aether. 'The Head...' is also a concept album, based on the well-worn Orpheus myth no less, and this serves to give the record its forlorn anchor. It's melancholy music, but teems with an awe that Davachi delights in enhancing with her dizzying psychoacoustic processes. Each element feels mutable, shifting imperceptibly between electronic and acoustic consistencies and imparting rhythm to rubbery beatless stretches and obscure, mystickal tonality to the goosebump-inducing laments.
Aside from performing on four (!) different pipe organs, Davachi plays Mellotron, the Korg CX-3 electric organ, the Prophet 5 and the Korg PS-3100. She's accompanied by Andrew McIntosh on viola, Mattie Barbier on trombone, mezzo-soprano Lisa McGee, Pierre-Yves Martel on viola da gamba, Eyvind Kang on viola d'amore, Rebecca Lane on bass flute, Sam Dunscombe and Michiko Ogawa on bass clarinet, M.O. Abbott and Weston Olencki on trombone and the Harmonic Space Orchestra, who handle additional woodwind. What's remarkable is how congruent the end result is with all this additional instrumentation. We're given a sense of Davachi's concentration as both a composer and soloist as she melts her organ and electronic work with ensemble pieces, retaining sonic through-lines that help us to visualise her over-arching themes. She begins with 'Prologo', a sensuous pipe organ composition that's recorded on two instruments - one in Oberlin's Fairchild Chapel and one in the Temppeilaukio Church of Helsinki. This piece sets the standard for the album; it's deliriously intricate but never overwhelming, throbbing with warmth from Davachi's confident processing and recording of the root tones and subverted by her unique grasp of tuning, space and the art of deep listening itself.
Pay close attention and you'll begin to unravel her cascade of canny saturations and sonic u-turns - this ain't drone for the drone's sake, it's as multifaceted as a broken stained glass window, loaded with harmonic sleights that'll have you wondering what exactly it is you're hearing. Although the palette is different on 'Possente Spirto' - with Davachi on Mellotron, synth and tape-delay alongside McIntosh on viola and Barbier on trombone - her technique holds the line, disrupting pools of tonal magick that pull away from the instruments' expectations without losing their unique essence. Similarly, McGee's angelic voice seems to merge with Davachi's sub-heavy organ quivers on 'Trio for a Ground', coiling towards the immortal realm while Kang and Martel signal the baroque era's somber reverence. Each long piece sounds as if it's preparing us for Davachi's jaw-dropping conclusion, the 23-minute 'Night Horns', a solo pipe organ composition she recorded at l'Église du Gesù in Toulouse. It might be the most staggering piece she's written, a tonal and rhythmic masterclass that fully exposes the roots of her discipline. Play it loud - there's so much going on in every frequency that it sounds as dense as a full orchestra, with kinetic vibrations that constellate into a byzantine satin lattice. There's none of the quiet-loud power ambient subterfuge here, just a measured, confident soft force that's so expressive it's almost overwhelming.
We really can't say enough about this one so we'll stop here, but if you just buy one record this year...
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Boomkat Product Review:
Sarah Davachi surpasses herself on this one, following the brilliant 'Antiphonals' and 'Two Sisters' with a decisive suite of mind-bending psychoacoustic chamber-prog dilations that effortlessly reconcile her last decade of relentless R&D. There's plenty of organ music around at the minute, but 'The Head...' undoubtedly sets a new high: sonorous, cryptic, endlessly inquisitive music that pulses with mystery and supernatural awe.
Like every instrument with a romanticised cultural chronology, the organ as an instrument should be more than just a simple texture to tack on for aesthetic gravitas. Davachi understands this implicitly, and breaks the fourth wall on 'The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir', challenging perceptions while acknowledging the instrument's contemporary ubiquity and historical symbolism. It's deviously clever stuff that concludes a loose trilogy with a swagger that never overwhelms its formal rigor - only bolsters it. Like its predecessors, the album further refines Davachi's idiosyncratic minimalism, but this time the Los Angeles-based composer grinds her skills until they're obsidian sharp, cutting her litany of influences into a lysergic compound that hums with arcane power.
We'd never be so bold to say it's tongue-in-cheek exactly, but Davachi's limberness here allows her to mess with the formula and compose hypnotic stretches that operate on multiple levels simultaneously. At times, the album pays its respect to the distant past, harnessing the spine-chilling roundness of the organ and its sacred resonances - but Davachi is just as passionate about classic '70s prog rock, psych and kosmische music, and if you listen close enough you can make out blurred traces of the genres' lofty conceptual bombast and druggy fractalism hanging in the aether. 'The Head...' is also a concept album, based on the well-worn Orpheus myth no less, and this serves to give the record its forlorn anchor. It's melancholy music, but teems with an awe that Davachi delights in enhancing with her dizzying psychoacoustic processes. Each element feels mutable, shifting imperceptibly between electronic and acoustic consistencies and imparting rhythm to rubbery beatless stretches and obscure, mystickal tonality to the goosebump-inducing laments.
Aside from performing on four (!) different pipe organs, Davachi plays Mellotron, the Korg CX-3 electric organ, the Prophet 5 and the Korg PS-3100. She's accompanied by Andrew McIntosh on viola, Mattie Barbier on trombone, mezzo-soprano Lisa McGee, Pierre-Yves Martel on viola da gamba, Eyvind Kang on viola d'amore, Rebecca Lane on bass flute, Sam Dunscombe and Michiko Ogawa on bass clarinet, M.O. Abbott and Weston Olencki on trombone and the Harmonic Space Orchestra, who handle additional woodwind. What's remarkable is how congruent the end result is with all this additional instrumentation. We're given a sense of Davachi's concentration as both a composer and soloist as she melts her organ and electronic work with ensemble pieces, retaining sonic through-lines that help us to visualise her over-arching themes. She begins with 'Prologo', a sensuous pipe organ composition that's recorded on two instruments - one in Oberlin's Fairchild Chapel and one in the Temppeilaukio Church of Helsinki. This piece sets the standard for the album; it's deliriously intricate but never overwhelming, throbbing with warmth from Davachi's confident processing and recording of the root tones and subverted by her unique grasp of tuning, space and the art of deep listening itself.
Pay close attention and you'll begin to unravel her cascade of canny saturations and sonic u-turns - this ain't drone for the drone's sake, it's as multifaceted as a broken stained glass window, loaded with harmonic sleights that'll have you wondering what exactly it is you're hearing. Although the palette is different on 'Possente Spirto' - with Davachi on Mellotron, synth and tape-delay alongside McIntosh on viola and Barbier on trombone - her technique holds the line, disrupting pools of tonal magick that pull away from the instruments' expectations without losing their unique essence. Similarly, McGee's angelic voice seems to merge with Davachi's sub-heavy organ quivers on 'Trio for a Ground', coiling towards the immortal realm while Kang and Martel signal the baroque era's somber reverence. Each long piece sounds as if it's preparing us for Davachi's jaw-dropping conclusion, the 23-minute 'Night Horns', a solo pipe organ composition she recorded at l'Église du Gesù in Toulouse. It might be the most staggering piece she's written, a tonal and rhythmic masterclass that fully exposes the roots of her discipline. Play it loud - there's so much going on in every frequency that it sounds as dense as a full orchestra, with kinetic vibrations that constellate into a byzantine satin lattice. There's none of the quiet-loud power ambient subterfuge here, just a measured, confident soft force that's so expressive it's almost overwhelming.
We really can't say enough about this one so we'll stop here, but if you just buy one record this year...
Boomkat Product Review:
Sarah Davachi surpasses herself on this one, following the brilliant 'Antiphonals' and 'Two Sisters' with a decisive suite of mind-bending psychoacoustic chamber-prog dilations that effortlessly reconcile her last decade of relentless R&D. There's plenty of organ music around at the minute, but 'The Head...' undoubtedly sets a new high: sonorous, cryptic, endlessly inquisitive music that pulses with mystery and supernatural awe.
Like every instrument with a romanticised cultural chronology, the organ as an instrument should be more than just a simple texture to tack on for aesthetic gravitas. Davachi understands this implicitly, and breaks the fourth wall on 'The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir', challenging perceptions while acknowledging the instrument's contemporary ubiquity and historical symbolism. It's deviously clever stuff that concludes a loose trilogy with a swagger that never overwhelms its formal rigor - only bolsters it. Like its predecessors, the album further refines Davachi's idiosyncratic minimalism, but this time the Los Angeles-based composer grinds her skills until they're obsidian sharp, cutting her litany of influences into a lysergic compound that hums with arcane power.
We'd never be so bold to say it's tongue-in-cheek exactly, but Davachi's limberness here allows her to mess with the formula and compose hypnotic stretches that operate on multiple levels simultaneously. At times, the album pays its respect to the distant past, harnessing the spine-chilling roundness of the organ and its sacred resonances - but Davachi is just as passionate about classic '70s prog rock, psych and kosmische music, and if you listen close enough you can make out blurred traces of the genres' lofty conceptual bombast and druggy fractalism hanging in the aether. 'The Head...' is also a concept album, based on the well-worn Orpheus myth no less, and this serves to give the record its forlorn anchor. It's melancholy music, but teems with an awe that Davachi delights in enhancing with her dizzying psychoacoustic processes. Each element feels mutable, shifting imperceptibly between electronic and acoustic consistencies and imparting rhythm to rubbery beatless stretches and obscure, mystickal tonality to the goosebump-inducing laments.
Aside from performing on four (!) different pipe organs, Davachi plays Mellotron, the Korg CX-3 electric organ, the Prophet 5 and the Korg PS-3100. She's accompanied by Andrew McIntosh on viola, Mattie Barbier on trombone, mezzo-soprano Lisa McGee, Pierre-Yves Martel on viola da gamba, Eyvind Kang on viola d'amore, Rebecca Lane on bass flute, Sam Dunscombe and Michiko Ogawa on bass clarinet, M.O. Abbott and Weston Olencki on trombone and the Harmonic Space Orchestra, who handle additional woodwind. What's remarkable is how congruent the end result is with all this additional instrumentation. We're given a sense of Davachi's concentration as both a composer and soloist as she melts her organ and electronic work with ensemble pieces, retaining sonic through-lines that help us to visualise her over-arching themes. She begins with 'Prologo', a sensuous pipe organ composition that's recorded on two instruments - one in Oberlin's Fairchild Chapel and one in the Temppeilaukio Church of Helsinki. This piece sets the standard for the album; it's deliriously intricate but never overwhelming, throbbing with warmth from Davachi's confident processing and recording of the root tones and subverted by her unique grasp of tuning, space and the art of deep listening itself.
Pay close attention and you'll begin to unravel her cascade of canny saturations and sonic u-turns - this ain't drone for the drone's sake, it's as multifaceted as a broken stained glass window, loaded with harmonic sleights that'll have you wondering what exactly it is you're hearing. Although the palette is different on 'Possente Spirto' - with Davachi on Mellotron, synth and tape-delay alongside McIntosh on viola and Barbier on trombone - her technique holds the line, disrupting pools of tonal magick that pull away from the instruments' expectations without losing their unique essence. Similarly, McGee's angelic voice seems to merge with Davachi's sub-heavy organ quivers on 'Trio for a Ground', coiling towards the immortal realm while Kang and Martel signal the baroque era's somber reverence. Each long piece sounds as if it's preparing us for Davachi's jaw-dropping conclusion, the 23-minute 'Night Horns', a solo pipe organ composition she recorded at l'Église du Gesù in Toulouse. It might be the most staggering piece she's written, a tonal and rhythmic masterclass that fully exposes the roots of her discipline. Play it loud - there's so much going on in every frequency that it sounds as dense as a full orchestra, with kinetic vibrations that constellate into a byzantine satin lattice. There's none of the quiet-loud power ambient subterfuge here, just a measured, confident soft force that's so expressive it's almost overwhelming.
We really can't say enough about this one so we'll stop here, but if you just buy one record this year...
Boomkat Product Review:
Sarah Davachi surpasses herself on this one, following the brilliant 'Antiphonals' and 'Two Sisters' with a decisive suite of mind-bending psychoacoustic chamber-prog dilations that effortlessly reconcile her last decade of relentless R&D. There's plenty of organ music around at the minute, but 'The Head...' undoubtedly sets a new high: sonorous, cryptic, endlessly inquisitive music that pulses with mystery and supernatural awe.
Like every instrument with a romanticised cultural chronology, the organ as an instrument should be more than just a simple texture to tack on for aesthetic gravitas. Davachi understands this implicitly, and breaks the fourth wall on 'The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir', challenging perceptions while acknowledging the instrument's contemporary ubiquity and historical symbolism. It's deviously clever stuff that concludes a loose trilogy with a swagger that never overwhelms its formal rigor - only bolsters it. Like its predecessors, the album further refines Davachi's idiosyncratic minimalism, but this time the Los Angeles-based composer grinds her skills until they're obsidian sharp, cutting her litany of influences into a lysergic compound that hums with arcane power.
We'd never be so bold to say it's tongue-in-cheek exactly, but Davachi's limberness here allows her to mess with the formula and compose hypnotic stretches that operate on multiple levels simultaneously. At times, the album pays its respect to the distant past, harnessing the spine-chilling roundness of the organ and its sacred resonances - but Davachi is just as passionate about classic '70s prog rock, psych and kosmische music, and if you listen close enough you can make out blurred traces of the genres' lofty conceptual bombast and druggy fractalism hanging in the aether. 'The Head...' is also a concept album, based on the well-worn Orpheus myth no less, and this serves to give the record its forlorn anchor. It's melancholy music, but teems with an awe that Davachi delights in enhancing with her dizzying psychoacoustic processes. Each element feels mutable, shifting imperceptibly between electronic and acoustic consistencies and imparting rhythm to rubbery beatless stretches and obscure, mystickal tonality to the goosebump-inducing laments.
Aside from performing on four (!) different pipe organs, Davachi plays Mellotron, the Korg CX-3 electric organ, the Prophet 5 and the Korg PS-3100. She's accompanied by Andrew McIntosh on viola, Mattie Barbier on trombone, mezzo-soprano Lisa McGee, Pierre-Yves Martel on viola da gamba, Eyvind Kang on viola d'amore, Rebecca Lane on bass flute, Sam Dunscombe and Michiko Ogawa on bass clarinet, M.O. Abbott and Weston Olencki on trombone and the Harmonic Space Orchestra, who handle additional woodwind. What's remarkable is how congruent the end result is with all this additional instrumentation. We're given a sense of Davachi's concentration as both a composer and soloist as she melts her organ and electronic work with ensemble pieces, retaining sonic through-lines that help us to visualise her over-arching themes. She begins with 'Prologo', a sensuous pipe organ composition that's recorded on two instruments - one in Oberlin's Fairchild Chapel and one in the Temppeilaukio Church of Helsinki. This piece sets the standard for the album; it's deliriously intricate but never overwhelming, throbbing with warmth from Davachi's confident processing and recording of the root tones and subverted by her unique grasp of tuning, space and the art of deep listening itself.
Pay close attention and you'll begin to unravel her cascade of canny saturations and sonic u-turns - this ain't drone for the drone's sake, it's as multifaceted as a broken stained glass window, loaded with harmonic sleights that'll have you wondering what exactly it is you're hearing. Although the palette is different on 'Possente Spirto' - with Davachi on Mellotron, synth and tape-delay alongside McIntosh on viola and Barbier on trombone - her technique holds the line, disrupting pools of tonal magick that pull away from the instruments' expectations without losing their unique essence. Similarly, McGee's angelic voice seems to merge with Davachi's sub-heavy organ quivers on 'Trio for a Ground', coiling towards the immortal realm while Kang and Martel signal the baroque era's somber reverence. Each long piece sounds as if it's preparing us for Davachi's jaw-dropping conclusion, the 23-minute 'Night Horns', a solo pipe organ composition she recorded at l'Église du Gesù in Toulouse. It might be the most staggering piece she's written, a tonal and rhythmic masterclass that fully exposes the roots of her discipline. Play it loud - there's so much going on in every frequency that it sounds as dense as a full orchestra, with kinetic vibrations that constellate into a byzantine satin lattice. There's none of the quiet-loud power ambient subterfuge here, just a measured, confident soft force that's so expressive it's almost overwhelming.
We really can't say enough about this one so we'll stop here, but if you just buy one record this year...
2LP Gatefold
Available To Order (Estimated Shipping between 7-14 Working Days)
This item is to the best of our knowledge available to us from the supplier and should ship to you within the time-frame indicated. If there are any unforeseen issues with availability we will notify you immediately
Boomkat Product Review:
Sarah Davachi surpasses herself on this one, following the brilliant 'Antiphonals' and 'Two Sisters' with a decisive suite of mind-bending psychoacoustic chamber-prog dilations that effortlessly reconcile her last decade of relentless R&D. There's plenty of organ music around at the minute, but 'The Head...' undoubtedly sets a new high: sonorous, cryptic, endlessly inquisitive music that pulses with mystery and supernatural awe.
Like every instrument with a romanticised cultural chronology, the organ as an instrument should be more than just a simple texture to tack on for aesthetic gravitas. Davachi understands this implicitly, and breaks the fourth wall on 'The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir', challenging perceptions while acknowledging the instrument's contemporary ubiquity and historical symbolism. It's deviously clever stuff that concludes a loose trilogy with a swagger that never overwhelms its formal rigor - only bolsters it. Like its predecessors, the album further refines Davachi's idiosyncratic minimalism, but this time the Los Angeles-based composer grinds her skills until they're obsidian sharp, cutting her litany of influences into a lysergic compound that hums with arcane power.
We'd never be so bold to say it's tongue-in-cheek exactly, but Davachi's limberness here allows her to mess with the formula and compose hypnotic stretches that operate on multiple levels simultaneously. At times, the album pays its respect to the distant past, harnessing the spine-chilling roundness of the organ and its sacred resonances - but Davachi is just as passionate about classic '70s prog rock, psych and kosmische music, and if you listen close enough you can make out blurred traces of the genres' lofty conceptual bombast and druggy fractalism hanging in the aether. 'The Head...' is also a concept album, based on the well-worn Orpheus myth no less, and this serves to give the record its forlorn anchor. It's melancholy music, but teems with an awe that Davachi delights in enhancing with her dizzying psychoacoustic processes. Each element feels mutable, shifting imperceptibly between electronic and acoustic consistencies and imparting rhythm to rubbery beatless stretches and obscure, mystickal tonality to the goosebump-inducing laments.
Aside from performing on four (!) different pipe organs, Davachi plays Mellotron, the Korg CX-3 electric organ, the Prophet 5 and the Korg PS-3100. She's accompanied by Andrew McIntosh on viola, Mattie Barbier on trombone, mezzo-soprano Lisa McGee, Pierre-Yves Martel on viola da gamba, Eyvind Kang on viola d'amore, Rebecca Lane on bass flute, Sam Dunscombe and Michiko Ogawa on bass clarinet, M.O. Abbott and Weston Olencki on trombone and the Harmonic Space Orchestra, who handle additional woodwind. What's remarkable is how congruent the end result is with all this additional instrumentation. We're given a sense of Davachi's concentration as both a composer and soloist as she melts her organ and electronic work with ensemble pieces, retaining sonic through-lines that help us to visualise her over-arching themes. She begins with 'Prologo', a sensuous pipe organ composition that's recorded on two instruments - one in Oberlin's Fairchild Chapel and one in the Temppeilaukio Church of Helsinki. This piece sets the standard for the album; it's deliriously intricate but never overwhelming, throbbing with warmth from Davachi's confident processing and recording of the root tones and subverted by her unique grasp of tuning, space and the art of deep listening itself.
Pay close attention and you'll begin to unravel her cascade of canny saturations and sonic u-turns - this ain't drone for the drone's sake, it's as multifaceted as a broken stained glass window, loaded with harmonic sleights that'll have you wondering what exactly it is you're hearing. Although the palette is different on 'Possente Spirto' - with Davachi on Mellotron, synth and tape-delay alongside McIntosh on viola and Barbier on trombone - her technique holds the line, disrupting pools of tonal magick that pull away from the instruments' expectations without losing their unique essence. Similarly, McGee's angelic voice seems to merge with Davachi's sub-heavy organ quivers on 'Trio for a Ground', coiling towards the immortal realm while Kang and Martel signal the baroque era's somber reverence. Each long piece sounds as if it's preparing us for Davachi's jaw-dropping conclusion, the 23-minute 'Night Horns', a solo pipe organ composition she recorded at l'Église du Gesù in Toulouse. It might be the most staggering piece she's written, a tonal and rhythmic masterclass that fully exposes the roots of her discipline. Play it loud - there's so much going on in every frequency that it sounds as dense as a full orchestra, with kinetic vibrations that constellate into a byzantine satin lattice. There's none of the quiet-loud power ambient subterfuge here, just a measured, confident soft force that's so expressive it's almost overwhelming.
We really can't say enough about this one so we'll stop here, but if you just buy one record this year...
2CD gatefold card wallet
Available To Order (Estimated Shipping between 7-14 Working Days)
This item is to the best of our knowledge available to us from the supplier and should ship to you within the time-frame indicated. If there are any unforeseen issues with availability we will notify you immediately
Boomkat Product Review:
Sarah Davachi surpasses herself on this one, following the brilliant 'Antiphonals' and 'Two Sisters' with a decisive suite of mind-bending psychoacoustic chamber-prog dilations that effortlessly reconcile her last decade of relentless R&D. There's plenty of organ music around at the minute, but 'The Head...' undoubtedly sets a new high: sonorous, cryptic, endlessly inquisitive music that pulses with mystery and supernatural awe.
Like every instrument with a romanticised cultural chronology, the organ as an instrument should be more than just a simple texture to tack on for aesthetic gravitas. Davachi understands this implicitly, and breaks the fourth wall on 'The Head as Form'd in the Crier's Choir', challenging perceptions while acknowledging the instrument's contemporary ubiquity and historical symbolism. It's deviously clever stuff that concludes a loose trilogy with a swagger that never overwhelms its formal rigor - only bolsters it. Like its predecessors, the album further refines Davachi's idiosyncratic minimalism, but this time the Los Angeles-based composer grinds her skills until they're obsidian sharp, cutting her litany of influences into a lysergic compound that hums with arcane power.
We'd never be so bold to say it's tongue-in-cheek exactly, but Davachi's limberness here allows her to mess with the formula and compose hypnotic stretches that operate on multiple levels simultaneously. At times, the album pays its respect to the distant past, harnessing the spine-chilling roundness of the organ and its sacred resonances - but Davachi is just as passionate about classic '70s prog rock, psych and kosmische music, and if you listen close enough you can make out blurred traces of the genres' lofty conceptual bombast and druggy fractalism hanging in the aether. 'The Head...' is also a concept album, based on the well-worn Orpheus myth no less, and this serves to give the record its forlorn anchor. It's melancholy music, but teems with an awe that Davachi delights in enhancing with her dizzying psychoacoustic processes. Each element feels mutable, shifting imperceptibly between electronic and acoustic consistencies and imparting rhythm to rubbery beatless stretches and obscure, mystickal tonality to the goosebump-inducing laments.
Aside from performing on four (!) different pipe organs, Davachi plays Mellotron, the Korg CX-3 electric organ, the Prophet 5 and the Korg PS-3100. She's accompanied by Andrew McIntosh on viola, Mattie Barbier on trombone, mezzo-soprano Lisa McGee, Pierre-Yves Martel on viola da gamba, Eyvind Kang on viola d'amore, Rebecca Lane on bass flute, Sam Dunscombe and Michiko Ogawa on bass clarinet, M.O. Abbott and Weston Olencki on trombone and the Harmonic Space Orchestra, who handle additional woodwind. What's remarkable is how congruent the end result is with all this additional instrumentation. We're given a sense of Davachi's concentration as both a composer and soloist as she melts her organ and electronic work with ensemble pieces, retaining sonic through-lines that help us to visualise her over-arching themes. She begins with 'Prologo', a sensuous pipe organ composition that's recorded on two instruments - one in Oberlin's Fairchild Chapel and one in the Temppeilaukio Church of Helsinki. This piece sets the standard for the album; it's deliriously intricate but never overwhelming, throbbing with warmth from Davachi's confident processing and recording of the root tones and subverted by her unique grasp of tuning, space and the art of deep listening itself.
Pay close attention and you'll begin to unravel her cascade of canny saturations and sonic u-turns - this ain't drone for the drone's sake, it's as multifaceted as a broken stained glass window, loaded with harmonic sleights that'll have you wondering what exactly it is you're hearing. Although the palette is different on 'Possente Spirto' - with Davachi on Mellotron, synth and tape-delay alongside McIntosh on viola and Barbier on trombone - her technique holds the line, disrupting pools of tonal magick that pull away from the instruments' expectations without losing their unique essence. Similarly, McGee's angelic voice seems to merge with Davachi's sub-heavy organ quivers on 'Trio for a Ground', coiling towards the immortal realm while Kang and Martel signal the baroque era's somber reverence. Each long piece sounds as if it's preparing us for Davachi's jaw-dropping conclusion, the 23-minute 'Night Horns', a solo pipe organ composition she recorded at l'Église du Gesù in Toulouse. It might be the most staggering piece she's written, a tonal and rhythmic masterclass that fully exposes the roots of her discipline. Play it loud - there's so much going on in every frequency that it sounds as dense as a full orchestra, with kinetic vibrations that constellate into a byzantine satin lattice. There's none of the quiet-loud power ambient subterfuge here, just a measured, confident soft force that's so expressive it's almost overwhelming.
We really can't say enough about this one so we'll stop here, but if you just buy one record this year...
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